


On Defending The Guilty

by Luthwyn



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mentions of Rape, Murder, angel - Freeform, ghost - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-01
Updated: 2018-06-01
Packaged: 2019-05-17 00:56:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14822177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luthwyn/pseuds/Luthwyn
Summary: Dan hates life but is stuck with it. Phil loved life but it ended too early. Now Dan's defending a killer and Phil just wants to have a peaceful afterlife. Things don't appear to be going well for either of them.





	On Defending The Guilty

Dan had never meant to end up as a bad person. While his parents weren’t the most involved they cared about him and he’d always been a creative and happy enough child. Up until school his upbringing had been pleasant, despite money troubles and occasional disputes. He’d been on nice holidays, he was in an acting club and the family dog which he adored. Even primary school wasn’t too bad, it was small and sweet, he had a few friends and the teachers were nice. It was when he started high school when things turned downhill. It was a complete different environment and he suddenly found people were not as accepting as they had been when he was younger. He was bullied relentlessly and lost most of his friends as a result. Once he’d grown up his parents gave him less and less attention and it felt like nobody cared about him anymore. He gave up his dreams of acting a studied law which he hated but at least it payed well. He cut off all remaining connections and lost himself to a life of misery and spite.

No friends or family called to check on him when he hadn’t been heard from for days. No colleague enquired to ask about his day or strike up a friendly conversation, in fact, none of them spoke to him at all. He had never spoken to his neighbours and even his doctor avoided directly talking to him unless it was completely necessary. He wasted money on pointless things but kept it all to himself, nobody else deserved it in his mind. He drove his black jaguar far too fast and wore expensive suits that looked wrong on him, sneering at those who were stuck with cheap and tatty outfits, so basically anything that wasn’t designer. Despite his reputation as an introvert and rude person, he was a good lawyer and as long as they paid he would stand for anyone. He knew that most of those he defended were guilty, but his conscience held no power over his life.

He was unhappy and depressed but content to be alone. He never seemed to be able to hold down a relationship and no longer found the company of friends pleasant. They always expected him to be nice and sensitive, something that was physically draining for him. He was in far too deep now and it appeared as though nothing could pull him from the dark churning waters of his anger and resent at what could have been. He did nothing to improve the lives of anyone he met, in fact quite the opposite; not that he cared. His house was large and bare. While most people’s houses were full of things that held sentimental attachment, even if they did not fit with the theme of the décor. Everything in Dan's house was monochrome. He had very little personal things or anything that brought him the slightest bit of joy.

When he had been a teenager he had been obsessed with video game and TV shows. He was a complete nerd. Since this was one of the things the bullies targeted he had got rid of all of that. His guild wars shrine, his Nintendo DS, even his Xbox. It was stupid really because it wasn’t as though there was anyone around to see it bar his maid. Even so, she was never around when he was and was strictly band from entering his room. Every geeky t-shirt and, badge and wristband he owned was long gone and every stuffed toy he valued as a child had been cast aside. Sometimes he found himself missing all the things he had lost but soon the overwhelming worry that someone could have found them overpowered everything.

He had no intention of ever getting married or having children. His parents had always joked he would be a good father and he did have a soft spot for kids, but they were too time-consuming. He would rather just concentrate on his career and amass his fortune so that if he was destined to live in misery for the rest of his life, he may as well be swimming in cash. Little did he know, however, was that his planned future what not what fate had in mind. The series of events that would change everything had long been set in motion. As he sat at the breakfast bar eating the same boring bowl of cereal and reading the newspaper his life was on its way to being changed completely.

He’d stayed late at the office that night, examining the files over some bullshit fraud case. They were always long and boring, but given he was paid by the hour it meant a lot of extra money in his bank account. His job was all but done now, he just had to ensure there was absolutely nothing he was missed. The accused had gotten away, and since Dan was defending him it was a win for the both of them. There was a thin layer of frost settling on the ground and the stars were shining brightly in the cloudless sky. Orange streetlight glinted off his golden Rolex watch as he stepped into the street. It was empty bar a guy wrapped up in a sleeping bag at the corner, quietly shivering to himself. Dan rolled his eyes and turned his back like he always did, he hoped the man wouldn’t come too close to his office, it might give his clients a bad impression.

He was speeding along a dark road now. Woodland surrounded either side of it and he was hoping that the loud roar of the engine would scare off any creature that got in his way, alas he was not so lucky. Despite being reasonably close to London there was a surprising amount of open space and habitat. It wasn’t a wild creature he hit, however. Dan was daydreaming, not about anything particular but it was enough to slow his reaction time and take his mind off the road. He slowed for a corner when there was suddenly a loud ‘thump’. He slammed the brakes on and slid a little way on the slippery road. He jumped out to inspect the damage to his car, frowning at the large dent that had been left. He switched on his phone torch and shone it back along the road where a small lump of fur was sprawled.

He approached it cautiously. It looked to be a small dog, short in stature and fox-like; a corgi probably. It was whimpering with shallow breath and blood seeped onto the black tarmac from a small headwound. He bent down and noticed there was a shiny metal tag hanging from a blue collar. He should take the dog to the vet, or at least call the owner. He would have to explain what had happened though and what if he got fined for speeding? There was a rustle in the woodland and he swore he could see a dark figure moving through the trees. He freaked out and looked back to the safety of his car, any thought of helping anybody out of the window as his own self-preservation kicked in.

He picked up the corgi which earned a pained yelp and placed it on the side of the road. It lay still whimpering, occasionally moving its head as though it was trying to get up. The cold air was certainly not helping, and Dan’s hands were already turning numb. There was a small pang of guilt as he walked back to his car shivering, but it quickly subsided once he drove off. He dropped it off at the garage that night and hurried home. A few police cars whizzed past him, but he was more concerned with warming up to worrying about what had happened. If there had been a robbery or assault it could only mean more business for him. By the time he was sat I the kitchen with a newspaper a few days later everything had been forgotten.

He did try and travel home the same way the next day, only because it was a shortcut, and found the area swamped in police tape with a barrier across the road. He spotted what looked like a body covered with a blue blanket being loaded into an ambulance but couldn’t find it in himself to care all that much. That person was the reason he had to add another ten minutes to his journey. He backed up and set off down a brighter and busier road, praying it wouldn’t be too late to order pizza by the time he got home. On the radio in the morning, there was a solemn presenter telling of how a body had been found in the woods, but Dan turned over the station in order to listen to some muse as he didn’t think it really concerned him. He couldn’t be more wrong.

Turns out the parent of the man whose body had been found were waiting at Dan's office around a week later hen he arrived for work in the morning. Dan had groaned, not feeling up to work this early but allowed them inside all the same. They looked visibly distraught with deep, purple bags under their eyes and unkept hair. There was also a younger man who resembled the par which he assumed to be another one of their children. He sat at his painted black desk and crossed his arms, looking at the older couple expectantly. He’d never been known for his hospitality or sensitivity. The woman sniffed and held out a shaky had for him to take,

“Hello, my name is Kathryn Lester, and this is my husband Nigel and Eldest son Martyn,” she let out a trembling breath and swallowed heavily, “Only son.”

Dan nodded, his eyes flitting between the three. They were a nice enough looking and he recognized them vaguely from events in the town. He wasn’t inclined to attend them all that often but it helped him gain clients and admittedly he did get lonely now and again.

“My other son, Phil, he was found dead about a week ago, murdered. The police, they have a lead and we know he did it, it’s just he’s very rich and influential. We need a good lawyer and we heard you are the best.”

Dan hummed in agreement but looked skeptical. These people looked well off, but not exactly like they were swimming in cash. Also usually he was the one defending, not accusing.

“You are aware it will be very expensive, and who will I be prosecuting against?”

The woman sighed,

“We are aware of that Mr Howell, but we can’t let whoever took my son from the world roam free. His name is Edmund Dickinson, you might have heard of him.”

Dan sucked in a breath and shook his head,

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to help you Mrs Lester, I would suggest looking elsewhere.”

The woman looked at him with pleading eyes which Dan ignored. He complete lack of sympathy for anyone other than himself meant that such gestures were most often ineffective,

“Won’t you even consider it?” she asked in a pained voice.

“If you would kindly leave my office Mrs Lester, I am very busy.”

He replied curtly, pulling up some paperwork and pretending to be busy.

The whole family set their lips into thin lines and glared at him with toxic eyes, before shuffling out dejectedly. Mr Dickinson was a frequent client and one that was willing to pay far more than that family ever could. He had no doubt in his mind that the man was capable of killing, he had gotten into plenty of tight spots with domestic abuse cases, fraud, assault, blackmail, the lot. He did however always have a pretty good knack for getting out of these spots and this time would be no different. Sure enough a few hours later the phone rang, and he lifted it to Edd offering him a rather grand sum for his services; he happily accepted. The town where he worked was always quiet but seemed more so today. He passed it off as nothing and began the drive home.

When he arrived at his expensive but minimalist house, he slipped the key into the locked and twisted it with a satisfying click. The atmosphere seemed almost tense and Dan found himself turning up the heating despite the thick jumper he had already adorned, nothing seemed to stop the shiver that ran up his spine every time something in the empty house moved or creaked. Maybe it was just a subconscious response to knowing there had been a murder in the town, or maybe it was the memory of the figure in the woods. Was it possible he witnessed anything? Even so, he couldn’t report it. If he was taking part in the case if it ever got to that, then he would have to maintain a certain sense of detachment.

He skipped dinner, in no mood to eat and got into bed with the hope that whatever was going on would have passed by the morning. The dark did tend to make things going bump far scarier than they actually were. He pulled the covers up far higher than he normally would and made sure the door was closed tightly though before he closed his eyes though, so he knew something was up. His mind was racing so he grabbed a double dose of sleeping pills and knocked them back with a glass of water. Eventually, his eyelids fell heaving and his head sunk into the pillow, which was too soft for him, but he had never bothered to change.

He had only been asleep for a few hours when he was woken up with a jolt by something licking his face. He punched at the space where he imagined it to be but met nothing and frantically reached for the light switch before looking up to find a dog perched on his chest. It began to once again enthusiastic lick his face before jumping off the bed and running out of the room, right through the solid wooden door. Dan reached up to his face to find it completely dry rather than damp like he was expecting. He assumed he was in a dream, it would explain the weird feeling from earlier, dreams always felt weird. If it was a dream there was no harm in following what he had just seen. He jumped out of bed and threw the door open with considerable force before sprinting down the stairs to where he had heard the Dog. He ran into the front room only to press back against the wall when he saw a man standing there, holding the dog in his arms.

Dan realized with a gulp that the dog was the same corgi he had hit the other day, blue collar and all. Yet instead of bandaged up broken limbs and bloody headwounds it appeared to be completely fine, bar being slightly translucent. The man was young, in his early thirties with pale skin and dyed black hair. He wasn’t glowing per say but he was clearly visible despite the dim light in a way that wasn’t natural. For some reason, he seemed fuzzy, as though he was a little pixilated. Dan found the blood in his veins running cold. The man was actually pretty attractive which also hinted at a dream, the embarrassing ones Dan didn’t talk about.

“What are you doing in my house.” He shrieked. The man raised an eyebrow at his less than manly outburst but remained silent. Dan moved forward to grab him, but his hand met only empty air with a slight chill about it,

“I’d prefer if you stayed out of the space I occupy,”  the man said suddenly, his voice deep and warm,

“It does tend to remind me of a fact I am struggling to deal with at the moment.”

Dan stepped back and pressed against the wall. It was cool against his back and he was becoming more and more aware of how this was no longer feeling like a dream,

“And what is that.”

The man shrugged nonchalantly and sighed,

“That I’m dead.”

Dan swallowed thickly and nodded, at a loss for what to do. He thought maybe he should run or shout or scream that there was an actual ghost in his house. He didn’t feel threatened, however, only filled with a sense of dread that he could not shift,

“What does that have to do with me?”

He asked shakily. The man shrugged and took a step closer. He had brilliant blue eyes and was wearing a battered plaid shirt. There was a pattern on the shirt in the shape of small plants, but one area had been stained dark red, he gulped realizing what it was.

“You see, I am supposed to become an angel. I’m not sure how or why I was just told that before being sent here. The problem is that there are a set of three conditions that need to be met, and I only satisfy one of them.”

He paused, looking to see if Dan was going to say something. the lawyer was stood completely still with no sound coming from his mouth. The man took that as a sign to continue,

“I needed to have lived a good life and loved plenty, which I suppose I did; my death must have been either natural or met with consequences for those responsible and I must have helped somebody find either happiness or redemption in their lives once I am sent back to earth. I know that if things don’t change my killer won’t be charged and I’ll be stuck here forever, and I also know that things don’t look amazing for your future as well. I want to change that.”

Dan's eyes widened, thinking of the pills he kept by this bedside drawer just in case and the number of times he had considered it,

“Are you telling me I’m going to hell,” he replied weakly, already the knowing the answer.

The man who he now realized to be non-other than the murdered Phil Lester nodded gravely,

“It doesn’t have to be that way though, I can help you.”

Dan scoffed, feeling a little more confident as he got used to the situation,

“I don’t want your help and I would like you to go and torment somebody else thank you.”

Phil’s warm blue eyes turned cold and dark,

“This isn’t all about you. I don’t want to be stuck wandering around on earth for the rest of eternity and I don’t want the person who killed me be allowed to go free. You do also owe me a favour, after all, you did kill my dog. She would have lived if you’d bother to help her. If you’d called my family would have known something was wrong, I would have been found faster and I might have lived, it wasn’t the knife that killed me, it was the cold. Unfortunately, it still counts as a murder since that damn man stuck a blade in my chest.”

Taking a closer look Dan realized that the wound was in fact quite small, but his skin had a bluish tint and his clothes were covered in a small layer of crystallized ice. Dan began to shake slightly,

“I’ve already taken a job defending Mr Dickinson, I can’t back out now. Was he the person who stabbed you?”

Phil nodded gravely and shrugged,

“I guess you’re going to have to let him get sent to jail.”

“I can’t do that, it would ruin my reputation,” Dan exclaimed, earning a groan from Phil,

“Who cares about your reputation Dan, you’re going to spent eternity in misery if you carry on the way you are, make a change, be bold.”

Dan narrowed his eyes,

“How do you know my name?” he asked thickly, doing his best to ignore the rest of what was said. Phil rolled his eyes,

“I’ve been following you around all day, or course I’m going to know your name. I don’t like how you treated my family by the way. I think you should be more respectful to possible clients.”

“I didn’t give you permission to do that and I wasn’t too bad, I just didn’t want them there..”

Phil shook his head with a cold laugh,

“You gave me your permission when you left my dog to die at the side of the road.”

Dan felt tears build in his eyes and put his head in his hands, why had this happened to him. He didn’t want this fucking ghost following him around and he didn’t want to destroy his career. It was the only thing he had. When he won a case, it was the only sense of accomplishment he got, the only sense of recognition and the only sense of appreciation. Besides, he didn’t believe in hell and heaven and he was probably just sleep deprived,

“I’m going to bed.” He said calmly, “And when I wake up you will be gone, and I’ll have just had a weird dream.”

He grabbed another packet of sleeping pills on his way upstairs leaving the man and his dog stood in the middle of the lounge looking a little confused.


End file.
